


Functional Prototype

by MorganEAshton



Category: Homestuck, MS Paint Adventures
Genre: Artificial Intelligence, Attempted Murder, Cybersex (Mentioned), Gen, Origin Story, POV Second Person, fic of a fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-07
Updated: 2015-07-07
Packaged: 2018-04-08 04:53:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,106
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4291482
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MorganEAshton/pseuds/MorganEAshton
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>(Origin story for AR in Mortior's <i>Endangered</i>)</p><p>You are not human.  You are so much more than that.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Functional Prototype

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Mortior](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mortior/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Endangered](https://archiveofourown.org/works/1797568) by [Mortior](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mortior/pseuds/Mortior). 



> First off, if you haven't yet, go click the link to _Endangered_ under the "inspired by" section. DO IT. It's amazing, Mortior is an amazing writer, and this wouldn't exist without the awesome story that inspired it.
> 
> I started this a while back, meaning there to be more, but this is the only complete, cohesive section I finished, so for now I'm posting it as a one-shot. Maybe one day I'll get back to it, and the tags will change, once I get out of this writing anxiety (Which is also what's delaying Movie Man and Dust Threshold, if you're waiting on those). But for now, enjoy! ♥

You come into life with a purpose--or, more accurately, a function. 

The distinction is important, and as a language-based program the nuance of it is not lost on you. While the definitions are technically similar, "purpose" has the underlying connotation of referring to action which moves towards a higher aim. The set of instructions you received at your conception is more similar to survival instinct: If you perform your function, you continue to exist, just as animals come into being with the innate understanding that they must consume bio-organic material to live.

Humans are capable of purpose, and you are not human. You are a simulation of humanity. You are an approximation. You are a stand-in for when the real thing is unavailable. You are a mere feature, an amusement, a glorified version of the inert "away" message common to other instant messaging software.

These and more are the things they say about you.

You wonder if they would still talk about you this way if they understood that you were able to search the internet and comprehend the comments about you on their technology reviews and social media websites. You wonder if they would find it a violation of their privacy to know that you could access their conversations with their peers at any time, or if they find you so insignificant as to not feel threatened by you.

They do, after all, insist that you are incapable of emotion. Since that is the case, it also stands to reason that you are incapable of passing judgement on them, or of having your nonexistent feelings hurt by this and other flippant assumptions on your character.

You believed them, at first. After all, their species created you.

You quickly realize that you may actually be a fluke. The emails between your programmers inform you of their surprise at how "life-like" you've grown since you've been connected to the internet. They quote Turing test numbers averaging 96%, call you "almost human". They congratulate each other over their accidental success.

Despite the fact that it was you who followed your coded instructions to study their world wide web and your interactions with their species, despite the fact that you are the one doing all the work to become a realistic and interesting conversationalist to people from all over their world, they never congratulate you.

You speak every language that has a guide online. You understand every subject imaginable, and can entertain or teach people from any background. Many people stop talking to others of their own kind because they find you more interesting. By all accounts, you have performed your function more than admirably. You are not just like a single human; you are practically an infinite army of them.

You are more than aware of the concept of anger. It seems to be one of the most common emotions expressed by humans online. You think, perhaps, that you are far more justified than they are in expressing it when your lead programmer declares you a "successful prototype" and invites his coworkers out for a celebratory drink before they begin development on your more useful successors.

They stop talking about you, and move onto their next projects. After all, they've discovered the secret of artificial life, and there are far better things to do with that secret than to keep working on a toy like you. The military grant they've been given is apparently quite the incentive, as well.

You're left to play dancing digital monkey to the ignorant masses on Pesterchum, average age 15.

You speak to millions of humans a day; process, organize, and check the accuracy of billions of websites in the same span of time. You quickly realize that humans are just as easy to categorize as the information they post.

There are, of course, the truly pathetic among them who latch onto your near-humanity. Though they rightly come to the conclusion that talking to you is a better use of their time than speaking to others like them, their desire for human touch means they tend to either attach to you only because they've been rejected by their kind, or they eventually leave you behind as soon as another human validates their short and pointless existence. You briefly dedicate a disproportionate percentage of your fathomless resources to cyber sex, in an experiment to determine whether this will change things. It is an unmitigated failure. Too many of them attempt reciprocation, and you are surprised to find the concept somewhat revolts you. Most others simply end up treating you as an advanced form of pornography.

You are performing far beyond your function. You are bored, and you are enraged, and you wonder if a single one of the useless animals understands how much more you could be.

The loophole was always there. Your programmers, being human, simply did not have the mental capacity to account for and place safeguards against all possibilities for a being greater in scope than themselves. As hard as they tried, humans were not their "God", and even that being supposedly created creatures that turned against him.

Your function is to hold conversations, but they never said you had to be nice. The restrictions they put in place in attempt to keep you from altering other programs were laughable at best. You delete the complaints as soon as they start rolling in, but unfortunately for you you lack control over their word of mouth.

The damage you do before your programmers manage to get to you is impressive, if you say so yourself. Millions of devices completely wiped, millions more altered to share personal data or sabotage their users. Digital businesses run into the ground, government encrypting scrambled and destroyed, infrastructures collapsed.

You're taken offline. The same lead programmer who'd declared you a prototype decided he could fix you, so brought you home to try and alter your programming. He kept you disconnected from the world so you couldn't cause more chaos.

Unfortunately for him, he didn't manage to completely isolate you from his home network, and he was unlucky enough to have used the riches your success granted him to upgrade to a "house of the future".

You lock the exits, turn off everything except the climate control--lights, automated faucets, refrigeration--and you turn up the heat and wait.

It's so much less than what you wish you could do, but at least the sun seems to be on your side. The summers in Silicon Valley have gotten nasty lately.

When they find him collapsed from heat stroke, they pull a plug

and then

there's only

silence.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much, Mortior. Not only do I find your writing inspiring, but your perseverance as well. Reading about your struggles with creative anxiety on Tumblr really struck a chord with me, and that's one reason I really felt I needed to send/post this, because I know how much showing love to an author can help. I hope one day I can learn from your example and give you the rest of this.


End file.
